I grew up on monsters and mecha, deep in the guts of the 70's and early 80's. This movie was fan-farking-tastic. I'm going again tomorrow.

The 3-D is entertaining and well done, but ultimately not necessary. If you can get 2D Imax, do that. There is a stunning amount of detail on the Jaegers and the kaiju. The kaiju are so Del Toro you could barf. It's Gundam Wing: Lovecraft. At the Mountains of Macross. It definitely riffs decades of Gojira flicks, but does so in a distinctly cracked-out Hellboy style.

Ringshadow:If we've been fighting Kaiju (sea dwelling giant monsters) for twenty years why do we still have coastal cities? Why not pack everyone's shiat, move to Kansas and bait the Kaiju onto large chunks of now-empty land to deal with them?

/in theory any large sea-dwelling creature will start to organ crush if on land too long!

By did not work I mean cringe inducing, horrible awkward scenes. The non American accents are not bad but appalling, and inconsistent, and this is a symptom of the director not caring about characters. If it were all robots and fighting, it would have made more sense, but it was the stupidest piece of shiat I have seen in a while. It was a comedy without jokes. It was just too awful to play to an adult audience.

Oh and the

Cyno01:Its my understanding from something i read a while back that the reason for giant robots instead of conventional weapons is that the Kaijus blood is extremely toxic and volatile, they blew up one of the first ones and turned, iirc, Tiujana or somewhere into a poisinous no mans land. Better to beat them to death and contain things. I think there was also some big cauterizing sword in one of the trailers?

There is a sword. It's too stupid to think about. Blood goes everywhere, they never revisit the toxic thing, to the point where people handle to corpses with their bare hands and apparently people eat it. And they use nukes to blow up one in the end (spoiler alert).

Hollie Maea:Those who have gone: Were there a lot of people in the theatres? The "Box office pundits" are still assuring me that Adam Sandler is going to beat this because "it can't overcome poor tracking".

It was pretty crowded. About 75%+, but for some reason, the theater picked a smaller screen. But people were cheering, laughing, holy shiatting, and applauding. And no, it's not much of movie for adults, but so what? It's the ultimate kids' (boys') movie, hands down. If this doesn't win best VFX at the Oscars', they should just cancel the category, b/c they clearly have no farking clue what they're doing (like picking Brave as best animated picture).

Hollie Maea:Those who have gone: Were there a lot of people in the theatres? The "Box office pundits" are still assuring me that Adam Sandler is going to beat this because "it can't overcome poor tracking".

At a 10pm showing last night there were already lots of people in line by 9pm, but when the movie started the theater was only around 75% full. It seems like the kind of movie where if you're excited about it then you're really excited and will show up early, but there are also large demographics of people with no interest in the movie, so overall, showings won't sell out and it won't make as much money.

CptnSpldng:Ringshadow: If we've been fighting Kaiju (sea dwelling giant monsters) for twenty years why do we still have coastal cities? Why not pack everyone's shiat, move to Kansas and bait the Kaiju onto large chunks of now-empty land to deal with them?

/in theory any large sea-dwelling creature will start to organ crush if on land too long!

I see the flaw in your cunning plan.

Look sunshine I'm not claiming it'll be enjoyable but it will be reasonably seamonster proof.

If you are looking for Citizen Kane, shut up, it's a movie about giant robots killing giant monsters.

BTW, it was my understanding that you were supposed to believe that the monsters adapted to the weapons meaning that missles might not work a second and third time around. The monsters also adapted their fighting styles to account for the robot tactics, hence the fight in Hong Kong with the EMP type weapon

Why didnt they use the goddamn swords the whole time?? They freaking sharknadoed a monster with the sword under water.

It's for dramatic effect. This movie is not meant to be realistic. It's a live action anime, two steps away from being Gurren Lagann (which is the ultimate in "we're going to gleefully fark logic and realism and everyone's going to love every minute of it!") Its a long-established trope of withholding your game-breaking supermove until the last minute. Who knows, maybe it had to charge up, or it uses resources when deployed that are needed for earlier in the fight, like the Elbow Rocket. How, I don't know. Who cares. Don't worry about it, and release your inner child while watching this movie

CptnSpldng:Ringshadow: If we've been fighting Kaiju (sea dwelling giant monsters) for twenty years why do we still have coastal cities? Why not pack everyone's shiat, move to Kansas and bait the Kaiju onto large chunks of now-empty land to deal with them?

/in theory any large sea-dwelling creature will start to organ crush if on land too long!

KhamanV:The kaiju are so Del Toro you could barf. It's Gundam Wing: Lovecraft. At the Mountains of Macross. It definitely riffs decades of Gojira flicks, but does so in a distinctly cracked-out Hellboy style.

ClintonKun:Anyone else catch the GlaDOS-esque line? Something like "Neural Bridge is now disconnected, would you like to try again?" I was grinning everytime the AI spoke, but that line was so very very GlaDOS.

Heh, my girlfriend just started playing Portal and hadn't seen the trailer that featured her voice. At that scene, she turned to me and said "Is that GlaDOS?!"

Smelly McUgly:I honestly didn't see the Benedict Cumberbatch one coming. That was genuinely funny. All the other hyperbolically-fake-and-ridiculous names were a set-up for that one actual name at the end.

scottydoesntknow:ClintonKun: Anyone else catch the GlaDOS-esque line? Something like "Neural Bridge is now disconnected, would you like to try again?" I was grinning everytime the AI spoke, but that line was so very very GlaDOS.

Heh, my girlfriend just started playing Portal and hadn't seen the trailer that featured her voice. At that scene, she turned to me and said "Is that GlaDOS?!"

Yeah, I was expecting the AI to go nutty at some point, or something like the Aperture Science logo on one of the equipment. The movie was ridiculously full of little details, as to be expected from a del Toro film, like the bellows on Charlie Day's Kaiju Drifting machine or the dead fish after the nuke, so I wouldn't count out an easter egg like the Aperture logo being somewhere in the background.

Trocadero:Just got back. Movie kicks all sorts of ass, sideways, upside down, etc. I've seen a lot of dumb action sci-fi junk over the years, but this looked the best. It's simply gorgeous, beautiful. Yeah, there's a definitive sag in the middle, when the humans have to do human stuff. It's not good, but it's not so terrible as to derail the greatest action beat downs in cinema. Also, it's just cheesy/campy enough to be endearing. I mean, it's a big time summer blockbuster, but that's still Jax from SAMCRO, walking around the Jaeger base w/ his pants in his hand, acting like he's about to grab his bike and go after Clay (who's also in this movie!) Also, there's a goofy plot contrivance to get Jax's robot fighting solo in Hong Kong that's got to be one of the dumbest, funniest, and most memorable lines in sci-fi history. It's like the ultimate hipster rallying cry, and it makes the movie better, BECAUSE it's so dumb. Also, the Russian pilots in their gear look totally bad-ass, that's going to be a very popular Halloween/cosplay get up for years to come.

A+. Its silly flaws somehow make it better. Simply the best visual effects I've ever seen. And Idris Elba got me pregnant, and I'm a dude.

/"It's the end of the world. You want to die here, or in a Jaeger?"//table finishes their shots

Trocadero:Just got back. Movie kicks all sorts of ass, sideways, upside down, etc. I've seen a lot of dumb action sci-fi junk over the years, but this looked the best. It's simply gorgeous, beautiful. Yeah, there's a definitive sag in the middle, when the humans have to do human stuff. It's not good, but it's not so terrible as to derail the greatest action beat downs in cinema. Also, it's just cheesy/campy enough to be endearing. I mean, it's a big time summer blockbuster, but that's still Jax from SAMCRO, walking around the Jaeger base w/ his pants in his hand, acting like he's about to grab his bike and go after Clay (who's also in this movie!) Also, there's a goofy plot contrivance to get Jax's robot fighting solo in Hong Kong that's got to be one of the dumbest, funniest, and most memorable lines in sci-fi history. It's like the ultimate hipster rallying cry, and it makes the movie better, BECAUSE it's so dumb. Also, the Russian pilots in their gear look totally bad-ass, that's going to be a very popular Halloween/cosplay get up for years to come.

A+. Its silly flaws somehow make it better. Simply the best visual effects I've ever seen. And Idris Elba got me pregnant, and I'm a dude.

/"It's the end of the world. You want to die here, or in a Jaeger?"//table finishes their shots

Yeah, that was the kind of line that would cause a lot of criticy nitpickers to jump at it and show how it's contradicted by the electronics on the Jaeger and so on and so on. But you know what, I'm sure del Toro and his team knew it and decided not to worry about it, because why? Because fark logic and kick reason to the curb, we're doing this because it's AWESOME, that's why! And they succeeded!

This movie was the best example of the Rule of Awesome since Gurren Lagann and and did it in the best, feel-good fark-yeah way. I've seen other movies try doing the Rule of Awesome and fail, like the Transformers movies, but Pacific Rim succeeded so very well at it.

Walker:Looks like a Power Rangers movie without the campy humor. Pass.

You are missing out, it was great. Of the movies I have recently seen it is the best one so far, this includes Iron man 3, Oblivion, World War z, GI JOE retaliation, etc. If I actually had to pay to go to the theater this would be the only one I would pay for to see

I know it goes against general movie critique, but you're really better off not questioning why they have the Jaegers to fight the Kaiju. It's a flimsy premise and we all know it, but this movie exists to have giant robots fight giant monsters. The story simply exists for the purpose of putting those pieces in place in the most logical way possible.

Even so, Del Toro did a great job on this one. The characters are basic tropes, but they're enjoyable enough. Charlie Day in particular really knocks his role out of the park and steals every scene he appears in. Yeah, he's still basically channeling his Always Sunny character into a science-nerd, but it's still really enjoyable and keeps things from getting too serious. Perlman was likewise really enjoyable, and I wish we'd gotten more of him. I really liked the idea of there being a black market for kaiju parts, since the clean-up portion of giant monster fights is often overlooked.

Most importantly, the movie does a really good job at letting the viewer know what's happening in the fight. Unlike every single fight in Transformers, where everything just turns into a steel-colored blur of nonsense, the fights here are well-choreographed and easy to follow, which is a godsend. Bay should be forced to watch this film on repeat before he dares ever bring Transformers around again.

/if I have one complaint, it's that I really had a hard time buying that everyone would stop building the effective giant robots in favor of a giant freakin' wall//seriously, you'd think they would be cranking them out nonstop if only because the military would love the endless funding///my bet is the wall had some really good lobbyists

Here's the thing: if Michael Bay released the exact same f*cking movie, it would be universally panned and there would be a nonstop Fark hatefest over it. The fact that a great dramatic filmmaker can make a piece of steaming sh*t like this and get a pass just because of who he is makes me want to dropkick a bunny rabbit.

HotWingAgenda:Here's the thing: if Michael Bay released the exact same f*cking movie, it would be universally panned and there would be a nonstop Fark hatefest over it. The fact that a great dramatic filmmaker can make a piece of steaming sh*t like this and get a pass just because of who he is makes me want to dropkick a bunny rabbit.

Same material, done differently. If you give two people a sea bass, and one makes it with a light garlic breading with a hint of lemon and the other rolls it around in yard debris before deep frying it, I imagine one would be favored and one would be universally panned.

wildcardjack:I have a general criticism for giant standing tanks or flip flopping spacecraft in sci-fi...

If you move a 100 foot arm (or moment arm) with the same angular speed as a human arm; you'll shred any material you could use to build it.

Unless you've got control over mass-inertia. Then you can write a blank cheque.

They actually did a really good job creating a sense of weight in this one. With a few (noteable) exceptions the Jaegers and the Kaiju are all believably heavy in motion, despite the obvious impossibility of them being in motion in the first place.

Great movie. Went to see Hunnam, Perlman, Day and Elba ham it up while giant robots rocket-punched giant monsters in the face and everyone but Elba delivered. Of course, by that mean he brought some real chops while everyone else happily chewed scenery.

I will pay money to see this again in some format at some point in the future, which these days is really saying something.

HotWingAgenda:Here's the thing: if Michael Bay released the exact same f*cking movie, it would be universally panned and there would be a nonstop Fark hatefest over it. The fact that a great dramatic filmmaker can make a piece of steaming sh*t like this and get a pass just because of who he is makes me want to dropkick a bunny rabbit.

Shadowknight:HotWingAgenda: Here's the thing: if Michael Bay released the exact same f*cking movie, it would be universally panned and there would be a nonstop Fark hatefest over it. The fact that a great dramatic filmmaker can make a piece of steaming sh*t like this and get a pass just because of who he is makes me want to dropkick a bunny rabbit.

Same material, done differently. If you give two people a sea bass, and one makes it with a light garlic breading with a hint of lemon and the other rolls it around in yard debris before deep frying it, I imagine one would be favored and one would be universally panned.

Exactly. VERY different approach. For one thing, to start out, del Toro is a geek and Bay is a fratboy. This is incredibly self-evident in the way they direct. For example, in every scene, the Jaegers and Kaiju are lovingly cinematographed, even when their wrestling. It's obviously made by a man who loves to geek out over robots and monsters. The Transformers, in contrast, are there to make explosions and crack jokes. The Transformers are obviously designed by geeks, because there's lots of lovely details, but Bay never gives the camera a chance to give us a good look. The only time Bay gives the camera a good time to stay in place for more than two seconds is if there's an ass on screen. With Pacific Rim, if del Toro had the chance to give us a good 5-minute tracking shot of Gipsy Danger showing off every little detail, I'm sure he would.

Another thing is del Toro's approach to characters. Though somewhat cliched, each of them have enough quirks to make them unique, except maybe the main character, though this is not the only film to have had trouble recently getting their main white male twenty-thirty something lead to be unique, so I don't take too much off for that. We all know del Toro's good at putting out good strong main characters. Hellboy, anyone? So, it's more a problem of recent trends in movies than anything else. Anyways, look at the way del Toro and Bay approach their main female characters. Megan Fox and what's her name from the 3rd Transformers were only there to bring two things. Tits and ass. And a third, get in danger, I guess. Bay is a fratboy, he doesn't look at women as anything less. Meanwhile, Rinko Kikuchi's character in Pacific Rim, Mako, is an actual human character. She has a tragic backstory, she's shy, she's badass. And, perhaps the thing most in contrast to Bay's style, there are absolutely no scenes where the camera is admiring her body. In fact, her body is pretty normal compared to Bay's surgically-enhanced bimbos. The least she wears is a tank top and sweatpants. If Bay were directing this, he'd probably cast someone with big boobs who'd probably wear a bikini instead of armor.

So, yeah, apple and oranges. People think this is a good movie because it IS a good movie.

HotWingAgenda:Here's the thing: if Michael Bay released the exact same f*cking movie, it would be universally panned and there would be a nonstop Fark hatefest over it. The fact that a great dramatic filmmaker can make a piece of steaming sh*t like this and get a pass just because of who he is makes me want to dropkick a bunny rabbit.

If Michael Bay did it - and he pretty much has - the fight scenes between giant, building-sized robots would be a close-up blur of elbows smashing into breastplates. What has been missing from these sorts of movies has been a sense of scale and context that these monsters and robots exist in the real world and that their battles have mass and weight.

Bashar and Asma's Infinite Playlist:HotWingAgenda: Here's the thing: if Michael Bay released the exact same f*cking movie, it would be universally panned and there would be a nonstop Fark hatefest over it. The fact that a great dramatic filmmaker can make a piece of steaming sh*t like this and get a pass just because of who he is makes me want to dropkick a bunny rabbit.

If Michael Bay did it - and he pretty much has - the fight scenes between giant, building-sized robots would be a close-up blur of elbows smashing into breastplates. What has been missing from these sorts of movies has been a sense of scale and context that these monsters and robots exist in the real world and that their battles have mass and weight.

I agree. The big fight in Hong Kong was dramatic because you could see what was happening throughout the carnage. Bay would have had so many closeups that you wouldn't be able to tell which jaeger was fighting which monster or who was winning.

As for why all the jaegers didn't have swords I can only think it's a cultural thing. The Russian jaeger had big metal fists and a lot of guns in its chest. The Chinese jaeger had three arms and extendable blades. The US jaegers had the plasma cannons. The swords appear to have been retrofitted to the Gipsy Danger jaeger at the last minute, but damn they were effective.

/building a stupid wall around the Pacific?//what do you do about the rivers///my wife pointed out the politician wanting the walls looked like Romney////maybe he had invested in wall contractors instead of jaeger construction

HotWingAgenda:Here's the thing: if Michael Bay released the exact same f*cking movie, it would be universally panned and there would be a nonstop Fark hatefest over it. The fact that a great dramatic filmmaker can make a piece of steaming sh*t like this and get a pass just because of who he is makes me want to dropkick a bunny rabbit.

Here's the thing: if McDonald's made this exact same Filet Mignon, it would be universally panned and there would be a nonstop Fark hatefest over it.

Back in the halcyon days of Battle of the Planets, Starblazers, Voltron and Robotech, the characters were hilariously one-dismensional. The big chief always gruff but occasionally fatherly; the male lead always a young hotshot gifted beyond any of his peers--but with a mile-wide rebellious streak; the scientists/doctors always bumbling comic relief...

No, it's not Citizen Kane, but it tipped its hat to the conventions of the genre and let me remember what it was to be 8 and watching anime shows that had a different sensibility than the ubiquitous Disney or Hanna-Barbera cartoons.

All you need to ask yourself is "Does seeing a giant mech punch a giant monster in the head sound like a good time?" If the answer is yes, go see it.

I just watched the movie. I enjoyed it. I do have to agree that they should have more scenes with the Jaegers fighting the Kaiju during the daytime. Also, they really need to pan out of the shot at times (why so many close ups?)